You build bombers!" they howled. "An art teacher and an English teacher!" In 1943 America's defense industries were so desperate for workers that school teachers were asked to work in factories during summer vacation. Slacks and Calluses is the story of two women--the image of "dignified schoolteacher-hood"--who went to work for Consolidated Vultee Aircraft, building bombers on the swing shift. Constance and Clara Marie traded their linen suits and "swooping" hats for blue cotton factory slacks and sturdy shoes, filled out dozens of government forms, packed up their few tools in what they hoped would pass for tool boxes--"small lunch boxes, the unpleasant color of unripe green olives"--and presented themselves for work. Over the next two months, they learned to use a wide range of tools, climbing in and out of B-24 Liberator bombers performing final installations--electrical wiring, seatbelt brackets, life rafts, bomb bay doors, the works. They also learned to deal with aching muscles and feet, grimy hands, lost sleep, and "dural termites"--slivers of duraluminum from the aircraft walls that worked their way under the skin. Even more trying was the change in the way they were treated--because they were wearing slacks. Female sales clerks were no longer polite, while men no longer offered their seats on crowded buses yet felt free to grab or whistle at them on the street. "Clothes, we reflected sadly, make the woman--and some clothes mak 20th century,americas,aviation,biographies,historical study and educational resources,history,humanities,military,social history,textbooks Humanities, Smithsonian Books

With a new epilogue. In 1943 two young teachers decided to do their part for the war effort by spending their summer vacation working the swing shift on a B-24 bomber production line. First published in 1944, Slacks and Calluses is an on-the-spot account of how two women assumed the wartime roles that would change society, coping with traditional attitudes they encountered along the way. Slacks and Calluses: Slacks and Calluses Reid, Constance Bowman / Bowman, C. / Bowman, Constance, Smithsonian Books

Reid, Constance Bowman; Bowman, C.; Bowman, Constance

Titel:

Slacks and Calluses: Slacks and Calluses

ISBN-Nummer:

9781560983682

In 1943 two spirited young teachers decided to do their part for the war effort by spending their summer vacation working the swing shift on a B-24 production line at a San Diego bomber plant. Entering a male-dominated realm of welding torches and bomb bays, they learned to use tools that they had never seen before, live with aluminum shavings in their hair, and get along with supervisors and coworkers from all walks of life.
They also learned that wearing their factory slacks on the street caused men to treat them in a way for which their "dignified schoolteacher-hood" hadn't prepared them. At times charming, hilarious, and incredibly perceptive, "Slacks and Calluses" brings into focus an overlooked part of the war effort, one that forever changed the way the women were viewed in America.